His Favorite Christmas Story
by tjmack
Summary: Edward Masen has always loved Christmas, but thanks to one fateful Christmas Eve, he becomes known for his story at Christmas.


His Favorite Christmas Story

Summary: Edward Masen has a love for Christmas, but after a brief encounter with a beautiful woman at a Christmas party, he becomes known for telling the story of their meeting.

**A/N: The title and idea for this story comes from the song His Favorite Christmas Story by Capital Lights. If you have not heard it, I recommend it.**

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**Part One (Edward's POV)-The Christmas Story**

Sitting at a small table watching as the beautiful couples sway around the dance floor. It's Christmas Eve in Forks, Washington. This is—or was my home. After my parents died, I left to live with my Uncle Carlisle. This is my first time returning in seven years. I'm twenty-three years old, and my job has brought me here. I see a beautiful girl across the dance floor. She's wearing a knee-length sundress. Her hair is pulled back into a loose fitting ponytail. Her hair, from this angle, seems to fall to about the middle of her back. She is the most beautiful girl I've seen. All I want is to ask her to dance. I glance up at the clock and see that it is near eleven o'clock. I don't have much time to work up the courage to ask her to dance. Taking a deep breath, I stand up, shove my fists into my pockets, and walk slowly around the dance floor and stop directly in front of the beautiful girl.

"Hi." Smooth Edward, really smooth.

"Hello." She smiles at me, and it sounds like a thousand angels are sing harmonies for this smile.

"I saw that you were here alone—would you like to dance?" I want to just hit myself in the head for sounding so much like an idiot. She smiles as she nods her head yes.

Reaching out my hand, I help her up, and we walk slowly, hand in hand out to the dance floor. The last few bars of the melody plays out before reach the dance floor, and the next song starts up. It's slow in rhythm. Being the gentleman I am, I stand as far away from this young lady as possible while still resembling a dancing couple.

"I do not bite, I promise." The light sound of giggles come from this angel's mouth, and I have to smile at her, even if in a sheepish way. I stand closer, and she winds an arm around my waist. I mimic her placing my arm around her waist, while keeping it high enough to not offend her. I sway us slowly around the dance floor. She smiles softly, and giggles once again.

"Having fun?" she nods softly.

"Please do not take offend—but you did not seem like someone who would be so smooth on a dance floor."

"I probably would not be. My mother made me take dance lessons when I was a young boy. Though the other boys ridiculed me for it, it did help me with ladies." I gain a bit of confidence and wink at her.

"I see that."

Sooner than I could have imagined or than I would have liked the song was over, and it was after eleven o'clock. I had to leave soon, I needed to get on the road if I was going to make the next town on my list.

"I am sorry Miss, I must bid you goodbye." I kiss her hand, and with that I am gone.

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**Part Two-Christmas Eve Dinner**

It's been six years since my lovely dance with the angel, the girl without a name. I'm twenty-nine years old, I have just recently lost my job, and I am alone for Christmas Eve. My Uncle Carlisle passed away just two years earlier—Aunt Esme followed last year. I have no one, but that fact cannot bring me down on this day.

"How can I help you sir?" a young waitress asks me. I am the only customer in this lonely roadside diner. I am certain that this young lady has family, someone that she would like to spend this day with. However she is stuck in this lifeless diner, with only me as company.

"I'm still undecided—I would like a little company though, would you mind sitting with me?"

She takes a quick peek around the diner, almost like she did not know that it was empty.

"That would be amazing sir."

"Please, you must call me Edward."

"Thank you—Edward."

"You are very welcome--" I pause and feel ridiculous not asking her for her name.

"Alice."

"Nice to meet you Alice." I stick my hand out toward her.

"As well you Edward." she takes my hand and shakes it more firmly than I would have thought she capable of.

"Please tell me, Alice, why you are in this diner on Christmas Eve, and not with your family?"

"I don't have any family Edward"

While this would sadden or upset most, Alice is full of energy and life. Just being around her lifts my spirits even more.

"I am so sorry to hear this Alice. I too have no family. We are like two peas in a pod I suppose."

She smiles gleefully at me, her cheeks turn rosy and finally she asks. "Could you tell me a Christmas story? They are my favorite."

"I have the perfect one." without further interruption I dive into the story of my angel, of the girl without a name.

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**Part Three: Christmas Eve Night Story**

"Mr. Masen, are you going to tell us the story again?"

Little Emmett Cullen is my favorite out of all the young teenagers that come to listen to me tell my favorite Christmas story every year. I have settled down in Forks, Washington. Part of me is hoping to find my nameless girl. The other part misses my hometown, misses feeling close to my parents, even if they are gone.

"Well of course Emmett. It is a tradition."

I have grown quite old over the years, and I feel awful that it has taken me twenty years to return home. Though I have called Forks home for nearly ten years now. My hair is starting to turn gray at the edges, and most people assume that I am much older than my forty-three years.

"Sweet, the rest were wondering. Now I have good news to give them."

Emmett smiles his wide, gap toothed smile at me, before lumbering off toward the small group of teenagers that attend my yearly Christmas story.

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**Later That Night**

It's near midnight on Christmas Eve, snow is falling at a steady rate, the temperature has dropped to well below freezing, and I can see a few of my audience members nodding off. Though, the ones most interested are wide-eyed. As usual, I get ready for the usual bout of questions that I know will be tossed my way.

"Why did you leave though?" Jasper Whitlock asked me.

"I had a job to do. I had a new town that I had to get to by ten the next morning. It was a ten hour drive, if I didn't leave when I did I wouldn't have made it on time."

"Why didn't you ask her to go with you?" Emmett asked.

"I had just met her Emmett. I would never ask a young lady to go anywhere with me—especially not that far—after just meeting them. I am a gentleman." I smile at him, knowing that Emmett is more outgoing, and a little less like a gentleman when it comes to ladies than I am.

"Why didn't you ask her name. I mean a true gentleman would have asked her name." Rosalie Hale, always a firecracker.

"I should have. It is a question that I have asked myself that same question numerous times over the years."

I see the parents start to come out of their homes and look at me. I smile at my audience before shooing them away, claiming that it was past my bedtime. I don't sleep much anymore, I usually spend the nights laying wide-eye in my bed, dreaming of what could have been.

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**Part Four-His last Christmas story**(**Bella's POV)**

The little grayed man laying in his hospital bed, so near death has grown on me. I too, am quite old, and I sit beside his bed after visiting hours. I know he doesn't have much longer, and no one should die alone. He has grown increasingly more sick over the years. It upsets me to think that this poor man has no family. No children or wife, no one to care whether he is alive or dead.

"Excuse me." his voice is barely a whisper and I barely hear it.

"Yes Mr. Masen?"

"Could you tell me a simple Christmas story? It is my favorite time of the year and it is my last request." Tears are welled in his eyes and get caught in the wrinkles that nearly eat up his eyes completely.

"Of course Mr. Masen."

I suddenly get a sense of deja vu, and Mr. Masen reminds me of someone, and the story starts to unfold. I tell him of a man that I have loved my entire life. A man that I never knew his name. A man I have never seen again, not since that fateful night on Christmas Eve at nearly eleven o'clock. It was the annual Forks Christmas Eve Festival followed by the Forks Christmas Eve ballroom dance. He was the most handsome and charming man I'd ever met. I see tears fall down Mr. Masen's face, and he smiles softly at me, the wrinkles around his lips crinkle slightly. For just an instant Mr. Masen is many years younger and I suddenly realize. This is my mystery man. This is the man that I have loved my entire life. I watch, with tears in my eyes, as he coughs lightly, and drags in a ragged last breath. With that he is gone. It has been sixty years, but I finally got the chance to see him—just one last time.


End file.
